


Once in a while, there's no need to stop the rampaging tears

by Background_Character



Category: Guardians of the Galaxy (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie) Spoilers, Character Death, Epic Friendship, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Please don't shoot me, Post-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS READ THE TAGS
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-30
Updated: 2018-04-30
Packaged: 2019-04-30 02:48:38
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,497
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14487159
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Background_Character/pseuds/Background_Character
Summary: ... because Peter is all alone on a dead world with nothing but the daughter of his quasi-father's killer, his once comrades ashes, an alien-human hybrid's spaceship and the stars to guide him home.





	Once in a while, there's no need to stop the rampaging tears

**Author's Note:**

> The usage of lowercase is intentional.

**one | nebula.**

that thing...

no, he tells himself.

even if she doesn't look all that human, even if she isn't of his kind, he doesn't have the right to call her something as equal as to what thanos essentially is.

thanos is a thing that will claim to kill in the name of mercy. she, however, is not.

... that woman has been staring at him for a good half of the last hour as he screamed his heart out, almost as she's indifferent to loss.

but he knows better than to think that. she mentioned a gamora during the fight. a gamora that seemed to set off both that monster and quill into a fiery rage. "who's gamora?" he asks the woman, wiping away the tears and staggering to his feet.

"my sister," she simply answers, looking away from him to direct her gaze upon the very places their other comrades used to stand, defeat rests in her eyes.

"oh." he connects the pieces in his head. whatever he might've said next dies in that moment. screw his loss, she lost her sister at the hands of her father. that doesn't even compare to his pain, even if she looks as calm and collected as she is right now. 

"now what?" her voice snaps him away from his thoughts.

"huh?"

"what will you do after this, now that you have mourned?"

"i, er, i don't... i don't know." quickly, he snorts in the snot running down his lips. "what about you?"

"i will track down my father and kill him, with own two hands if i have to."

"but that's suicide!" she turns to him and blinks in the face of his apprehension, possibly not caring for whatever concern he holds for her next motive.

"i know."

 

**two | stardust.**

when he starts to scrape things off the ground, she shoots him a look of confusion.

"what are you doing?"

"oh, me? i'm just... just gathering up their ashes, that's all."

"how foolish," she hisses through her teeth, "how can you possibly expect to gather every last grain on a planet like this?" and gestures to great sands that wavers through titan's atmosphere and makes up most of the planet's surface.

"hey, hey! i know it might sound stupid to you, but for me? this is probably the last thing i should be doing right now!" he protests.

"and where would you rather be?"

"... home."

she sighs, audibly enough so that it echoes in the air. he can see the beginnings of irritation on her face before it washes away in the blink of an eye. "you terrans are so sentimental sometimes."

"it's just who part of who we are," he whispers after a pause of silence. "what about you? don't you... feel anything for gamora?"

(bitterly, he remembers their earlier conversation. he knows he shouldn't have said anything more than was necessary.)

"of course i do!" she snaps. "but all my life, i've never been spared the luxury of being emotional, child—so i'm sorry if i don't come off as pitiful as you!" her feet snap forward, and soon enough, she's towering over him slightly with her inky black eyes staring into his soul and a twisted snarl on her face. he swears he can feel the press of a blade against his neck. "and maybe, just maybe—if i didn't feel as lonely as i do, i would've taken off by now, leaving you stranded here for the rest of your miserable days, collecting whatever is left of the dead."

"then why stay?" the knife retracts and she crouches slightly to meet him at eye level.

"because you remind me too much of her."

 

**three | module.**

somehow, they wander long enough through the wasteland of what was once beautiful to find quill's ship. "welcome to the benatar," she declares as a small stairway pops out from the haul with a hiss.

cautiously, he follows after her. the foreboding feeling in his stomach doesn't sit well with him. everywhere he looks, there are bit and pieces of the inside that just scream the people who ceased to exist before his very eyes. he can imagine it now: drax laughing at some old film reference quill made without understanding the context while chowing down on whatever snack is available in the cosmos; mantis looking around wide eyed as always, whisperedly asking around for the meaning of the joke; and quill jamming to whatever happens to be playing on that beaten stereo set up nearby; and everybody else part of the guardians he's never met. part of him thinks he'll never get to meet the two called rocket and groot that quill spoke so fondly of. apparently earlier, thor spirited them away to a place called nidavellir.

and he knows what happened to gamora.

he feels sick.

it's the kind of sick that makes him feel like he's intruding upon a personal moment with no need for outsiders.

"nebula," he calls out softly like a lost child. 

"what?" she doesn't look over her shoulder as she powers up the spaceship. 

"can we go look for your sister's... body?"

"go to vormir? are you stupid? that's the last place _i_ want to be."

"why?"

"it's my fault she had to tell thanos. just for me, that foolish sister of mine sacrificed half of the universe," she explains coldly, her fingers tightening around the controls. "if it weren't for me, maybe we wouldn't be here, maybe thanos wouldn't have won, maybe nobody would've died."

"... but then i would've never met you." this time, she turns around at his words. 

"excuse me?"

"didn't you hear doctor strange? he said there was no other way to mr stark, which means everything would've happened regardless of you or not."

"that still doesn't make the situation any better!" she shouts, focusing her attention back forward to the sky as the benatar's rockets forces them higher and higher.

and he goes quiet after that, allowing nebula to gather her thoughts as the vastness of space swallows them whole.

 

**four | stars.**

"i thought you said we weren't going to vormir."

"shut it, parker, and just help me load her into a cryopod."

"ma'am, yes, ma'am..."

carefully together, they maneuver the cold, cold body of gamora (her sister and quill's lover, his mind whispers shakily) into what nebula claims will preserve her until they make it somewhere where they can hold a proper burial. again, that funny feeling in his stomach begins to rise, but he quashes it all down in favour of trying his best to ignore the way she stares so forlornly off into the distance, her hand curled around gamora's.

in the silence, it's just their breath and heartbeats he can hear.

"let's go," she orders, finally letting go. never looking back.

peter wishes he could be as strong as her.

to have the strength to hide the pain and focus on the present.

to forget momentarily that he isn't the only other being suffering in the universe.

to remember that no sacrifice has been in vain.

even if it wasn't fair.

(nobody deserved to die that day. not gamora. not drax. not mantis. not quill. not doctor strange. not mr—tony.

if he could turn back time, peter would take that chance in a heartbeat. and he would face thanos all over again. and he'd face that thing with all his might and do his best not to die trying. and even if... there was a chance he was someone who turned to ash and dust, scattered to the winds, far away from earth... he wouldn't regret it at all.

never.

nebula has taught him that much.

and he'd be damned if he paid back her kindness with a shred of failure.

he'd say, "i'm sorry," before fading away.)

it's been so long since he felt the warmth of the sun on his skin.

in space, there is only emptiness, the stars, half broken planets and the two of them flying around.

looking for thanos.

looking for salvation.

looking for a place to call home.

 

 

* * *

 

 

**zero | the other side.**

_"mr stark?" the man looks at him like nothing he's ever seen before. "you don't look so good."_

_"kid—" staggering forward, his hero (mentor, father, and everything else he has ever been) falls into his arms._

_(and then he knows, this is the end.)_

_"mr stark, i don't understand, you can't, you can't—i don't want you to go."_

_"kid, kid? listen to me, everything's gonna be fine."_

_"please, sir, please, don't, don't... stay with me. you can't—happy and pepper—what do i—how—"_

_"peter..." and for a moment, he thinks he sees the phantom that came back from afghanistan years ago. the resignation in the man's eyes is all too real for this to be another joke. "sorry," tony says, crumbling apart._

_like water, what remains slips through his fingers and titan claims what it is owed._

**Author's Note:**

> Hi, this was kind of a what-if scenario. Hate it or love it, I just thought it'd be good to make myself sad by writing this.
> 
> *sheds a tear*
> 
> Bye.


End file.
